PCSO Digit Games

What the PCSO digit games are

The Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) runs the country's national lottery, and its lineup covers three broad families of games: lotto, sweepstakes and the Small Town Lottery⁵. Within the lotto family, the digit games are the small, fast, daily draws that sit alongside the big jackpot games like Ultra Lotto 6/58 and Grand Lotto 6/55, which we cover on the PCSO jackpot games page. For the wider picture of the national lottery, see our guide to the Philippines lottery.

The digit games are the 2D Lotto (better known by its old name EZ2), the 3D Lotto (still widely called Swertres), the 4D game and the 6D Lotto. These forms were added one by one after the original lotto launch, as the PCSO expanded from a single draw game into the full slate it runs today⁶.

What sets the digit games apart from the jackpot games is how they pay. The 6/42, 6/45, 6/49, 6/55 and 6/58 games pool money and build jackpots that roll over until someone hits them. The digit games pay fixed prizes instead: hit the 3D combination and you get P4,500 for every P10 you bet, whether 50 people or 500 hit the same numbers that day. That fixed-payout structure is why the digit games are so popular with regular bettors, and why your chances of actually winning something are much higher than in the jackpot games, where you need to match six numbers out of dozens¹.

You can see that popularity in the winner counts the PCSO publishes. On a single day, March 21, 2026, the three 3D Lotto draws produced 170, 122 and 455 winners respectively, and the 2 p.m. 2D Lotto draw alone had 282 winners⁷. These are games thousands of Filipinos play every day, usually for small stakes at a neighborhood outlet.

Swertres (3D Lotto): how to play and what it pays

Swertres, now officially the 3D Lotto, is the most played of the digit games. The mechanics are simple: you select one number from 0 to 9 in each of three columns, so a bet looks like 3-2-0 or 6-3-9. To win the main prize, your three digits must match the winning combination in the exact order drawn¹.

The normal bet is P10, and the prize is fixed at P4,500 per P10 Straight Play wager⁴. Because the payout scales with your stake, bigger bets win proportionally more: a P500 bet on the winning combination wins P225,000¹. There is no pool to share and no rollover; the prize is the same every draw.

You can check how this looks in practice from recent results. On September 24, 2026, the 2 p.m. draw came up 3-2-0 and paid P4,500 to each of 274 winners; the next day's 5 p.m. draw paid the same P4,500 to 132 winners⁸. On February 21, 2026, the 2 p.m. combination 6-3-9 paid P4,500 to 379 winners, and the 9 p.m. draw of 9-2-5 paid another 592⁹.

If you do not want to pick your own digits, you can ask the teller for a Lucky Pick and let the machine choose for you¹. There is also the Rambolito option, covered below, which relaxes the exact-order requirement.

A close cousin of Swertres is STL Swer3, part of the Small Town Lottery, which follows exactly the same mechanics: match three digits from 0 to 9 in exact order⁴. You can read more about the STL in our guide to jueteng and the Small Town Lottery.

EZ2 (2D Lotto): how to play and what it pays

EZ2, now officially the 2D Lotto, is the simplest game in the PCSO lineup. You select two numbers from 1 to 31, and to win the main prize your pair must match the winning combination in exact order¹. Note the range is different from Swertres: 2D uses 1 to 31, not 0 to 9.

The prize is a fixed P4,000 for a P10 Straight Play bet⁹. As with 3D, you can bet between P10 and P500 on a combination, and the payout scales with your stake¹.

The 2D draws produce winners constantly. On February 21, 2026, the 2 p.m. combination 01-25 paid P4,000 to 168 winners⁹; a month later, on March 21, 2026, the 2 p.m. pair 17-24 paid P4,000 to 282 winners⁷.

If picking two numbers feels like too much work, you can opt for a Random Pick, or play through the Rambolito System, which covers both orderings of your two digits⁴. The STL also runs a Swer2 game with similar mechanics, though there you match two digits from 0 to 9 in exact order⁴.

Bet types: Straight Play, Rambolito and Lucky Pick

Every PCSO digit game offers the same three ways to place a bet, and understanding the difference is the key to the whole family.

Straight Play is the standard bet. Your digits must match the winning numbers in the exact order drawn, and this is the bet that pays the full fixed prize: P4,500 per P10 on 3D, P4,000 per P10 on 2D¹.

Rambolito is the flexible option. Instead of needing your digits in the exact order, Rambolito covers every possible ordering of the digits you picked, so a 3D bet on 1-2-3 also wins if the draw comes up 3-2-1, 2-1-3 and so on. That makes it much easier to hit, but the prize per winning combination is smaller than Straight Play, since one Rambolito ticket effectively spreads your stake across several orderings⁴.

Lucky Pick (sometimes called Random Pick) simply lets the terminal choose your numbers for you. It costs the same and pays the same; the only thing you give up is the ritual of choosing⁴.

A practical way to think about it: if you have a strong feeling about a specific sequence, play it straight for the biggest payout. If you care about the digits but not their order, Rambolito trades prize size for coverage.

Draw schedule: three draws a day

The 2D and 3D Lotto are drawn three times a day, every day of the week, at 2 p.m., 5 p.m. and 9 p.m.¹. The 3D and 2D draws are part of the daily PCSO Lottery Draw program, which also features the jackpot games, 6D and 4D².

Since December 31, 2024, the draws have been broadcast live every day, Monday to Sunday, on the following channels²:

• analog and digital IBC-13
• D8TV
• the IBC DWAN 1206 AM radio channel

If you prefer to watch online, livestreams run on the official websites, Facebook pages and YouTube channels of PCSO, IBC-13 and DWAN 1206². Results are also published on the PCSO's official results page, and on social media⁴.

The 6D Lotto runs on its own schedule, covered in the next section.

6D Lotto: the wider digit game and its prize tiers

The 6D Lotto is the biggest of the digit games. On a play slip, you select one number from 0 to 9 in each of six columns, either by telling the lotto teller your numbers or by choosing Lucky Pick³. The minimum play amount is P12 per six-number combination, and you may put more than P12 on a combination³.

What makes 6D distinctive is that one combination gives you nine chances to win, because the prize tiers pay for matching digits from either end of the winning combination³:

The first prize starts at a guaranteed minimum of P150,000 and snowballs as long as no player matches the full winning combination, so it can grow well past that floor³.

The 6D Lotto is drawn every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 9 in the evening³. For years it was an exclusive game for Luzon players, but on February 11, 2020 it was drawn for the entire Philippines for the first time, and it is now available nationwide³. The draw is aired live over People's Television Channel 4, simulcast through the PCSO's Facebook and YouTube accounts³.

Buying a ticket and claiming your prize

Digit game tickets are sold at PCSO lotto outlets across the country, the small authorized booths you will see at malls, markets and storefronts everywhere in the Philippines. If you cannot reach an outlet, the PCSO also operates e-Lotto, its official online platform for buying lotto tickets online⁴. Stick to official channels; anything else is not a PCSO product.

Claiming a prize is straightforward at the digit game level. Prizes of P10,000 and below are payable in cash, and you can claim them from PCSO outlets, PCSO branch offices, or the Treasury Department of the PCSO Main Office¹⁰. Since the standard 3D and 2D Straight Play prizes are P4,500 and P4,000 for a P10 bet, most digit game wins fall under that cash threshold and can be collected on the spot at an outlet. Larger wins, such as a P500 3D bet paying P225,000, go through the branch or main office process.

Keep your ticket safe and sign it after purchase. A ticket is a bearer instrument in practice, so treat it like cash until it is validated and paid.

When the draws have stopped

The PCSO draws have been suspended a few times over the years, and it is worth knowing what happens when they are.

One game that used to be hard to find outside one region is 6D Lotto: for several years it was an exclusive game for Luzon players, and it only became available when it was drawn for the entire Philippines on February 11¹¹.

In 2020, during the pandemic, operations were halted again. The PCSO then ran "catch-up" draws, two draws per day, broadcast live over its Facebook pages and YouTube, and on government television PTV-4 (the latter on a delayed telecast), while regular gaming operations, including selling, ticket validation and prize claiming, remained suspended and all lotto outlets stayed closed¹². Games in areas under modified enhanced community quarantine stayed suspended even after other areas reopened¹³.

The lesson for a bettor is simple: if a draw is suspended, hold on to any tickets you already have, since catch-up draws are usually held to honor them, and check the PCSO's official announcements for when selling and claiming resume.